NLTRN: When blinds are big, when blinds are small.

[hra146]

Good day ladies & gentlemen,


I really feel there is a topic that we need to cover at least theoretically. Preflop play and blind size

While I understand that there is no ultimate guide to preflop play in HU NLTRN poker there must be theory about it. Regarding its adjustment compared to blind size I mean.

So far I have two arguments gathered that people repeatedly refer to. However, (and obviously) those contradict and Im not sure where the truth lies.


Theory No1:

When blinds are small be tight. There is no reason to get involved with marginal hands when there is nothing (read: relatively little) to fight for. As the blinds increase, loosen up on your starting requirements and raise more. Blinds now represent a considerable %age of your stack and every blindsteal is a big win.


Personal experience:

I used to play exactly like that. Dowsides are that you mostly lose chips in the first blindlevel. Also, when blinds get big and you raise pf and make a continuation bet, most of your stack is in the middle. You often are close to committed to a pot when your opponent does not give up on the flop. Losing such a pot usually puts you way behind in chip position.
Upside of this is that most opponents at the lower stakes tighten up considerably when blins increase. Loose calling stations suddenly start folding a ton, wait for big hands and very very rarely play back at you with nothing. You often take huge chunks out of their stack before they realize whats going on.

However, these kind of game dynamics also lead to a decreased amount of postflop action. Admittedly, for now its a neutral factor. However, when you play inferior opponents, you should want postflop action. You want to play preferrably raised pots in postion in order to capitalize on their mistakes as often as possible. So folding a lot early when blinds are small isnt an option really. Guess what, this leads me to the second gameplan I want to talk about.


Theory No2:


When blinds are small, you want to play as much as possible. A poster on this forum talked about having a VPIP being close to 100% (from the SB ofcourse) early on in the tournament. Since, especially at the lower stakes, you will often be playing passive opponents, limps will rarely be punished and there is not a lot of 3betting going on either. You are trying to get in pots cheaply planning to outplay your opponents postflop. Raising hands are those that play well postflop, and those you play for immediate value. Limping hands are those you only play because of magnificent pot odds, position and weak opposition.

As blinds get bigger a peek at the flop becomes more costly. So-called "trashhands" like 93s that you were gladly limping before now get mucked. The range of raising and limping hands becomes narrower. Your overall VPIP decreases. Most of those hands you now play you play for immediate value. Implied odds are severely cut and unless you get a great deal of fold equity with a raise, weak speculative hands are no longer worth playing. You generally keep limping medium strong hands hoping to finally stack you opponent in a hand (which happens plenty in unraised pots as well).


Personal experience:

Works well. However, only because I havent encountered opponents I couldnt _easily_ outplay postflop yet.

This again, brings me to the next idea: Maybe these two gameplans can have a peaceful coexistence and should be applied vs. different opponents only.

Lets look at the metagame of both first:

The perhaps most interesting thing about HU play on the internet is that you are guaranteed to be given a minimum of attention. Unlike 9max or 6max tables people WILL eventually notice what you are doing and adjust to it (or not). This is why even at the lowest stakes you can have a metagame and an image working for you.

Gameplan No.1 makes you seem very tight from the start. After you folded the SB 5 times in a row people WILL notice. And a tight image of you will someway or the other be stuck in their head. Some people are more objective about this than others, but the first impression you give is "tight". Usually not too aggressive either (and in our mind its also hard to correctly differentiate "tight" and "aggressive")
. So maybe the first note people will write (in their minds) is "Isnt doing much". When you do play, you rarely show down a complete trashhand. All of this works for you when blinds get big and pots become important. People will automatically fold more to you. Give you more credit. Essentially, you are changing gears, not at will, at command by the blinds, but you are changing gears. For one, that is very hard to see through by begginners. Also, its even harder to see through by capable players because they wouldnt expect you "a X + .x HUSNG donk" to actually change gears in order to be deceitful. These factors working for you, you can usually get away with a fair amount of preflop raising and pot stealing.


Gameplan No.2 focuses on postflop play. Preflop raising only "sets the scene" in early stages. Depending on how well you tipped the dealer, people will get annoyed with you quickly. Lots of preflop raising, continuationbetting, doublebarreling and checkraising going on. Additionally, your opponents will lose out on most deals you make. Now in their mind, you are coming off as overly aggressive. Since they arent used of any of what you are doing your "overaggressiveness" often tilts them. Badly. How to take advantage of that is very very player dependent, but usually it requires just a little bit of patience. Since the blinds have gotten big now, its often just a single move that costs them all of their chips. And the funny thing, they wont even avoid you as a player, cause they think you are terrible.


Summarizing both gameplans I would say that:

#1 plays the cards, not the player. Avoids lots of fancy postflop events. Good if you are unsure of your edge

#2 FKS. Emphasis on good postflop skills. Good when surely playing a donkey


So by writing this I may have answered that question myself. Maybe its only a choice of preferences (and your opponent). Maybe its just an asset to always have the other gameplan with you.

I dont know. Maybe all of what I have just written is a big bunch of bullcrap. I dont know.

You tell me.



greets,

hra

[dboy23]

awesome you wrote my poohbah post for me

[cwar]

I dont want a loose image against a weak player, I want them thinking Im squeeky tight (regardless of whether thats how Im actually playing or not) so that I can make moves, a tilting weak player is very hard to read and can be extremely dangerous. I want players playing in a way that defines their hands because I am a good hand reader and they arent, that way I can pick good spots to bluff and squeeze out value, Im not trying to setup huge hands because in HU sng's we are never deep enough for these type hands to really pay off.

LAG play's fundemental weakness is that you dont have a hand most of the time, this is the absolute wrong strategy to apply against weak players. In fact I think most people try and play too laggy where as the ideal style in HU is a tight controlled style. In general if you can hand read better than your opponent you want to be keeping the pots small and getting lots of information about his hands before you have to commit any real amount of chips.

Against good players in HU sng LAG play has a place because you can take good players out of there comfort zone and sort of create leaks in their game. An example would be you start to 3-bet a very wide range of hands and of course your good opponent adjusts by calling a wider range but he still plays fairly tightly against your flop cbets. This is something I became a master of by finding good places to build pots and then steal it away later, a lot of this depends on good board reading and foresight of scary cards. However, I have become a much better hand reader than I was in those days so I find that even this type of LAG play is often unnecessary so I will go on record as saying TAG > LAG in HU sng.

[cwar]

That being said very often it is correct to raise a wide range from the button and cbet very often but as the stacks get shallower the more you should cut back on your preflop raises and control your image, if you ever give me the choice between a tight HU image and a loose HU image I will ALWAYS choose the tight image regardless of whether we are 10bb or 200bb deep.

[Deewhizzle]

i would have to agree with Cwar here. the time when im playing my best, are when im paitent and plaing fairly tightly. agaisnt both Poor& Decent players. i do , however,tend to play a laggy style against Better players, and SO FAR it seems to work, but this is at lower level buyin sng,and most players at this level dont seem to adjust well . so i have yet to see the results in a situation where i am up against a Really solid player.

[theseus51]

I play the $22+$1 turbos on stars. Here's my general strategy.

I tend to start off fairly passive, and try to encourage passiveness in my opponent. Unless I pick up a super premium hand early on, I won't raise from the SB or BB in the first four rounds or so. I try to encourage limping, so I can limp too, and keep pots small. I start to raise PF more after a few rounds, but nothing too crazy, and still try to keep the pots manageable. I figure this gives me a tight image, and can steal a lot more when the blinds get to 25/50. However, if I get caught bluffing too many times, or he seems like a calling station, I really tighten up, figuring I need a hand to play. Opposite is true, if I show down monsters or he's folding a lot, I'll keep up the aggression.

On the flip side, if he doesn't wanna go along with my "play nice" attitude early on, and raises a lot, then I switch gears. I have a "so this is how it's gonna be huh?" attitude, and do a range of things. Limp/raising from the SB, check-raising a lot more, and generally playing a lot more LAG. Suffice to say, these types of matches have lots of big pots, and tend to end rather quickly, haha.

[cwar]

Oh, god.

[HokieGreg]

lollerskates

[NNH]

I do this sometimes when I'm playing with scared money. I end up losing everytime, as I keep digging myself further and further into my passive little hole.

[hra146]

I appreciate your responses and Im aware of that Im merely uttering ideas I had.

Id still like to know how you, whatever your style is, change your play as blinds get bigger. I really cannot find any useful information about this for the life of meh.